The 58th General Conference Session of the Seventh-day Adventist Church will bring an international flavour to St. Louis, Missouri, the heart of the United States of America. The gathering from June 29 to July 9 will be representative of the nearly 30 million-strong Adventist Christian World family from around the globe, and will meet under a theme of "Transformed in Christ."
"We are expecting at least 400 reporters and media personnel to be accredited with our newsroom operation in St. Louis," says Ray Dabrowski, communication director of the world church, responsible for the news operation at Session. "Communication operation is not getting smaller. We expect more ‘column inches’ of news and features to appear in newspapers, and more radio and TV coverage. The Adventist Church is growing, its public presence is expanding, and we can also expect that our communication will need to respond with even greater efficiency than five years ago," he added.
The Communication Department at the world church headquarters is coordinating a mega operation that will include the services of a newsroom, official news and media relations on behalf of the church headquarters, as well as a 30-minute daily television newscast to be broadcast on the church’s Adventist Television Network. Details of the radio and TV broadcasts are still being developed and personnel selection is underway.
"In 2005 our operation will differ in the way we have shared communication resources as separate media entities in the church. It is expected that our internal news operation will be a joint effort of Adventist News Network, the Adventist Review, Adventist World Radio and Adventist Television Network," Dabrowski explains. "Though we are anticipating and planning that our coverage will need to suit our individual delivery systems, we will attempt to make resources in primary news development and photography available to each organization. This will save resources and hopefully bring synergy to our communication efforts within the church," he adds.
Apart from the newsroom area itself, from which reporters will be able to view the Session, the accredited press will also have access to seats near the stage. The newsroom operation will be equipped with the latest technology, and for the first time, the church news service will not offer traditional photographic services. "We are all digital this time," says John Beckett, Web master of www.adventist.org , who will be responsible for the online operations of the Session newsroom. "We will offer quick and efficient service, not only with news stories and photography, but also with providing both audio and video streams from St. Louis," he says.
According to John Banks, media relations director of the General Conference, current contacts with the local and national media, including religion desks, indicate that reporters from secular outlets are planning to cover the event. "It will depend on the news from the Session, and how attractive it would be to non-church reporters. The potential of numbers of our believers from around the globe gathering in one place is already attracting some interest among the media," Banks comments.
Along with Adventist News Network (ANN), the church's news agency "Adventist Press Service" (APD) with editorial offices in Basel (Switzerland) and Ostfildern near Stuttgart (Germany) will offer news coverage in German and English from the World Synod in St. Louis.
